Interpreting our Environment

Let’s get you to start thinking about how we interact with our environment and manage the energy that moves through our body to improve our overall health.

All matter within our universe must contain energy and emits a range of frequencies or wave functions. We interact with the world through sensing and interpreting these energy frequencies. Our brain responds through physiological reactions that keep us safe and give us the best chance of survival. This is the only goal of the brain and nervous system - ours and our species survival.

Let’s take a quick look at how we hear. Sound waves travel freely through the air. To be “heard” as a sound, these sound waves must be converted into electrical signals in the nervous system so our brain can interpret this signal into a sound. 

Converting sounds waves to an electrical signal: 

1. Sound waves enter the ear canal and travel towards our eardrum. 

2. The eardrum vibrates, causing the inner ear's bones to vibrate, amplifying the sound waves and sending them deeper into the ear towards to cochlea.

3. The sound waves cause ripples in the fluid along the basilar membrane in the cochlea.

4. Hair cells along the basilar membrane bend in response to the travelling wave. If the hair cells are depolarised, neurotransmitters are released and produce an electrical signal firing a specific neural pattern in the brain.

Similarly receptors in our eyes convert light waves into electrical signals, olfactory receptors produce electrical signals that give us a sense of smell. The body is full of receptors that convert energy into electrical signals that feed information back to the brain.

These electrical signals then activate neural circuits in the brain. With the repetitive firing of specific neural circuits, we are “hardwiring” or strengthening this circuit to activate without too much conscious effort. Think about when you put on your shoes - you don’t really need to think step by step what you are doing because this neural circuit has been hardwired through years and years or firing. 

The above explains our energetic interaction with the external environment; however, the same neural activity can be stimulated by a single thought. Have you ever experienced salivation just at the thought of your favourite food? When you think about that specific food, you are firing the same neural circuit that would be fired when you are actually consuming that food, and it results in the same physiological reactions. 

Our thoughts, therefore, play a significant role in our health, as negative thoughts create stress on our nervous system and prolonged stress is detrimental to our health. If we can become more aware of how we are interacting (and interpreting) our internal and external environments, we may start to see why we might be struggling with poor health, lack of motivation and decreased cognitive function. We can then “re-programme” these habitual neural patterns and make those “better” decisions easier to make.